[TheClimate.Vote] December 10, 2020 - Daily Global Warming News Digest
Richard Pauli
richard at theclimate.vote
Thu Dec 10 11:26:32 EST 2020
/*December 10, 2020*/
[And in this case, 'Lessons not learned, will be repeated']
*You Should Have Listened, new York Tells Big Oil*
The comptroller's threat to pull billions from fossil fuel investments
is a big victory for climate activists.
By Bill McKibben
Mr. McKibben is a founder of the climate advocacy group 350.org and a
leader of fossil fuel divestment efforts.
Dec. 9, 2020
new York State's comptroller, Thomas Dinapoli, announced on Wednesday
that the state would begin divesting its $226 billion employee pension
fund from gas and oil companies if they can't come up with a legitimate
business plan within four years that is aligned with the goals of the
Paris climate accord. Those investments have historically added up to
roughly $12 billion.
The entire portfolio will be decarbonized over the next two decades.
"Achieving net-zero carbon emissions by 2040 will put the fund in a
strong position for the future mapped out in the Paris Agreement," he
said in a statement.
It's a huge win, obviously, for the activists who have fought for eight
years to get Albany to divest from fossil fuel companies and for the
global divestment campaign. Endowments and portfolios worth more than
than $14 trillion have joined the fight. This new move is the largest by
a pension fund in the United States, edging the new York City pension
funds under Comptroller Scott Stringer, who announced in 2018 that the
fund would seek to divest $5 billion in fossil fuel investments from its
nearly $200 billion pension fund over five years.
But it also represents something else: capitulations that taken together
suggest that the once-dominant fossil fuel industry has reached a low in
financial and political power.
The first capitulation, by investors, is to the understanding that most
of Big Oil simply won't be a serious partner for change. Mr. Dinapoli
had long been an advocate of engagement with the fossil fuel companies,
arguing that if big shareholders expressed their concerns, those
companies would change course. This, of course, should be how the world
works: He was correctly warning the companies that their strategy
endangered not only the planet but also their businesses, and they
should have listened.
But time and again, they let him down. In December of 2017, for
instance, after prodding from Mr. Dinapoli, Exxon Mobil agreed to
"analyze how worldwide efforts to adopt the Paris Agreement goals for
reducing global warming might impact its business," he said in a
statement at the time. That could have been a turning point. But two
months later Exxon published the absurd results of that analysis: The
Paris Agreement would have no effect on its business, and it could pump
all its reserves of oil and gas. (As it happens, leaked documents have
since made it clear that Exxon was planning to significantly increase
its emissions by ramping up production.)
Divestment remains a "last resort," Mr. Dinapoli said in his statement.
But he made clear that it was "an investment tool we can apply to
companies that consistently put our investment's long-term value at risk."
The oil industry has long wanted to cast itself as a responsible partner
for progress on climate change, as opposed to "unrealistic" divestment
activists. The Independent Petroleum Association of America even set up
an anti-divestment website to pressure decision makers like Mr. Dinapoli
not to pull the money they oversee out of fossil fuel companies.
Mr. Dinapoli deserves credit for standing up to the industry's
still-considerable power, even if it comes late in the game. And he is
now positioned to join Mr. Stringer as one of the strongest voices for
climate action in the financial sector. He can speak with the
unquestioned credibility of someone who tried to work collaboratively.
It's an argument that other investors are ready to hear, not just
because of the climate threat, but also because the fossil fuel industry
has been the worst-performing sector of the American economy for many
years now.
Its problems are twofold: It faces a sprawling resistance movement,
rooted in the undeniable fact that its products are wrecking the
planet's climate system. And in wind and sun, it faces formidable
technological competitors who can provide the same service, just cleaner
and cheaper.
These realities will destroy the coal, gas and oil barons; the only
question is, how fast. Big Oil's strategy at this point is delay, but
that course gets harder and harder, especially as the Trump
administration exits and with it the shield of protection the industry
has enjoyed.
There are signs that this second capitulation -- the surrender of the
oil companies to the reality of their situation -- has begun.
One of the so-called supermajors, BP PLC, announced this summer that it
would cut its oil and gas production by 40 percent over the decade and
significantly increase its investments in renewable energy. Divestment
campaigners can be excused for casting a jaundiced eye on the news -- BP
announced in 2000 that it was going "Beyond Petroleum," a crusade it
soon abandoned. But this time at least they have the rhetoric right:
"This coming decade," the company's C.E.O. said in a statement, "is
critical for the world in the fight against climate change, and to drive
the necessary change in global energy systems will require action from
everyone."
Even Exxon has been humbled to the point where a kind of silent
capitulation seems to be starting. As recently as 2013 it was the
biggest company on the planet; by this autumn it wasn't even the biggest
energy company, having been briefly surpassed in market capitalization
by nextEra Energy, a Florida-based renewables provider.
Last week Exxon made clear its new status, disclosing it would slash its
exploration and capital expenditure budget from a planned $30 billion to
$35 billion next year to barely half that and write off up to $20
billion in natural gas assets that it now acknowledges it will never pump.
This fall from grace for oil and gas companies can't come fast enough --
it recalls the collapsing fortunes of the coal industry over the past
decade, a slide that Mr. Dinapoli helped to exacerbate by divesting the
new York State pension fund from coal this past summer.
not only does the decline of Big Oil mean less carbon in the long run;
it also means less political influence in the short run and hence less
power to slow down the steps necessary for a transition to carbon-free
energy. Big Oil's influence on the Republican Party remains large, but
President-elect Joe Biden doesn't face the same hulking beast his
predecessors have had to work around. If Mr. Dinapoli can stand up to
these forces, it augurs well for what the new administration may accomplish.
Last month set the global mark for the hottest November ever recorded,
and it seems increasingly certain that despite a growing La nina cooling
in the Pacific, 2020 will tie or break the record for the hottest year.
The planet is heating rapidly, but -- as the news from Albany makes
clear -- so is the movement to do something about it.
Bill McKibben, a founder of the climate advocacy group 350.org, teaches
environmental studies at Middlebury College and is the author of
"Falter: Has the Human Game Begun to Play Itself Out?"
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/09/opinion/new-york-climate-change-divestment.html
[positivism]
*Earth Is Still Sailing Into Climate Chaos, Report Says, but Its Course
Could Shift*
The biggest polluters are continuing to pollute, raising the risks of
global warming. There are, however, new signs of a pivot to a green economy.
Somini Sengupta - Dec. 9, 2020
The world as a whole is dangerously behind schedule in slowing
catastrophic climate change, and its richest people will have to make
big changes in their everyday lives in order to shift course, a major
United nations report warned Wednesday.
But nearly five years after a landmark international climate agreement
in Paris, there are signs of a sea change, including from some of the
biggest polluters in the world.
The "undercurrent" of the global economy has shifted, said Christiana
Figueres, a former United nations diplomat who led the negotiations that
yielded the Paris Agreement in 2015. "We are moving faster than we ever
were," she said in a call with reporters Wednesday.
Most of the world's biggest emitters of planet-warming gases, including
China, have promised to draw down their emissions to net-zero by
midcentury, meaning that they would eliminate as much of the greenhouse
gases as they emit. If those promises are kept (a big if) the world
would come very close to the Paris agreement's goal of limiting
temperature rise to the levels required to avert the worst climate
disasters...
- -
Much more of the world's electricity, which used to come almost entirely
from burning toxic fossil fuels like coal, is now coming from renewable
sources, with the price of solar power having fallen far faster than
expected. Lawmakers -- including in big car markets like China, Britain
and California -- have announced an end to the sale of gas-powered cars
in the next 10 to 15 years, spurring carmakers to roll out more electric
vehicles. Some of the world's biggest investors are beginning to move
their money out of fossil fuel industries, while the International
Monetary Fund, hardly known for its environmental activism, said this
year that green measures would help the recovery of the global economy.
All is not well, though. Far from it.
The assessment published Wednesday by the United nations Environment
Program, the 11th annual Emissions Gap Report, found that greenhouse gas
emissions continued to grow between 2010 and 2019, by an average of 1.4
percent a year, with a far sharper rise in 2019, in part because of
emissions generated by wildfires, which are themselves exacerbated by a
warming climate...
- -
How effectively the United States and China can pivot their economies
away from fossil fuels is crucial to stemming global warming, shaping
global markets for clean technologies and nudging other major emitters
-- like India, Indonesia, Russia, and Brazil -- to do their part.
Inger Andersen, the head of the United nations Environment Program,
which published the annual Emissions Gap Report, urged world leaders to
invest their post-Covid recovery funds, saying that "a green pandemic
recovery can take a huge slice out of greenhouse gas emissions and help
slow climate change."
The report recommends, among other things, reducing, though not
eliminating, fossil fuel subsidies, stopping the construction of new
coal plants and restoring degraded forests.
Andrew Steer, the president of the World Resources Institute, a research
and advocacy group, described the trillions of dollars going into
post-pandemic economic recovery as "the biggest opportunity in history."
"If we invest that in yesterday's economy," he told reporters on a call
Wednesday, "we are basically committing a mortal sin for our
grandchildren, quite frankly."
But as the latest United nations report makes clear, we are not all the
same, nor do we all need to do the same thing to protect future generations.
The richest 1 percent of the global population produces more than twice
the greenhouse gas emissions than the combined share of the poorest 50
percent of the global population. The polluting rich, the report
concludes, will have to reduce their emissions footprint by a factor of
30 to avert the worst damages of a warming planet. That can be done, the
report adds, by reducing food waste, making buildings more
energy-efficient and taking public transit rather than cars, and trains
rather than planes, for short distances.
"The wealthy bear greatest responsibility," the report said.
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/09/climate/paris-agreement-anniversary-united-nations.html
[Better would be by 2024]
*Microsoft and 12 others join Amazon's climate change initiative*
Unilever also pledged to hit net zero carbon emissions by 2040.
Kris Holt - 12-9-2020
Microsoft and 12 other companies have joined Amazon's Climate Pledge,
which is a commitment to hit net zero carbon emissions by 2040. The
project aims to meet the climate goals of the United nations Paris
Agreement a decade early. Signatories also agree to regularly report
their greenhouse gas emissions.
Back in January, Microsoft committed to becoming carbon negative by
2030. Over the next 30 years, it also plans to remove more carbon from
the atmosphere than it has emitted since the company was founded in
1975. The company has been carbon neutral since 2012.
"no one company or organization can meaningfully address the climate
crisis on their own. It will take aggressive approaches, new innovative
technologies and strong commitment to collaboration across industries
and economic sectors," Lucas Joppa, Microsoft's chief environmental
officer, said in a statement. "By joining The Climate Pledge community
and working together, we will be able to collectively rise to the
challenge and curb our emissions so that we can make progress toward a
net zero future."
Among the other companies who just joined the Climate Pledge are
Unilever, UK broadcaster ITV and Coca-Cola European Partners. Previous
signatories include Uber, Best Buy, Siemens and Engadget's parent
company Verizon...
https://www.engadget.com/microsoft-amazon-climate-pledge-unilever-181555273.html
[Apple media say Variety]
*Climate Change Anthology Series From Scott Z. Burns Lands Apple Series
Order (EXCLUSIVE)*
Apple has given a series order to "Extrapolations," an anthology series
about climate change from Scott Z. Burns, Variety has learned exclusively.
Burns will write, direct, and executive produce the series, which hails
from Media Res. It is said to tell intimate, unanticipated stories of
how the upcoming changes to our planet will affect love, faith, work and
family on a personal and human scale. Told over a season of 10
interconnected episodes, each story in the scripted series will track
the worldwide battle for our mutual survival spanning the 21st century.
Variety exclusively reported that the series was in the works at Apple
earlier this year. Along with Burns, Michael Ellenberg will executive
produce via Media Res, with Greg Jacobs and Dorothy Fortenberry also
executive producing.
- -
"Most of the storytelling around climate change has focused on the
science and getting people to accept it," said Burns. "Our aim with
'Extrapolations' is to move beyond science and use drama, comedy,
mystery and every other genre to allow us to consider how every aspect
of our world is going to be changing in the years ahead. We know the
climate is going to change – 'Extrapolations' asks, can we change, too?"
- -
Burns previously produced the Oscar-winning climate change documentary
"An Inconvenient Truth" in 2006 and executive produced the followup "An
Inconvenient Sequel: Truth to Power" in 2017. His other credits include
several films that deal with major world issues, such as "The Report,"
"The Informant!," "Contagion," "Side Effects," and "The Laundromat."
He is repped by UTA and Jackoway Austen Tyerman.
The series marks the latest collaboration between Apple and Media Res.
https://variety.com/2020/tv/news/climate-change-anthology-series-apple-scott-z-burns-1234849794/
[Washington Post]
*The world's rich need to cut their carbon footprint by a factor of 30
to slow climate change, U.n. warns*
Despite sharp drop in greenhouse gas emissions during the pandemic, the
world remains on pace for catastrophic warming in coming decades
By Brady Dennis, Chris Mooney and Sarah Kaplan
Dec. 9, 2020
The world's wealthy will need to reduce their carbon footprints by a
factor of 30 to help put the planet on a path to curb the ever-worsening
impacts of climate change, according to new findings published Wednesday
by the United nations Environment Program.
Currently, the emissions attributable to the richest 1 percent of the
global population account for more than double those of the poorest 50
percent. Shifting that balance, researchers found, will require swift
and substantial lifestyle changes, including decreases in air travel, a
rapid embrace of renewable energy and electric vehicles, and better
public planning to encourage walking, bicycle riding and public transit.
But individual choices are hardly the only key to mitigating the
intensifying consequences of climate change.
Wednesday's annual "emissions gap" report, which assesses the difference
between the world's current path and measures needed to manage climate
change, details how the world remains woefully off target in its quest
to slow the Earth's warming. The drop in greenhouse gas emissions during
this year's pandemic, while notable, will have almost no impact on
slowing the warming that lies ahead unless humankind drastically alters
its policies and behavior, the report finds...
https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2020/12/09/carbon-footprints-climate-change-rich-one-percent/
[Politico - Opinion]
*Biden needs to Go Big on the Climate*
To motivate the country around the changes we need, Biden needs a
unifying theme. The right one is climate change.
By REP. RAUL GRIJALVA
12/08/2020
President-elect Joe Biden cited the new Deal as a major American
inflection point in his victory address to the nation, indicating that
we will need an equally massive policy response now to battle the
Covid-19 pandemic and heal our damaged economy. And as he no doubt
learned from Franklin Roosevelt, the window of opportunity for a
president to achieve that kind of sweeping impact starts to close the
moment he takes office...
- -
Our country's best hope for the future is a decarbonized economy built
around sustainable jobs and powered by clean energy. Rather than trying
to explain each individual project or set of projects in isolation,
fighting repeated hand-to-hand battles against the usual demagoguery and
anti-government rhetoric, the Biden-Harris administration should
continue what it started during the campaign. It should unite the
country around a common theme and a set of important and achievable
policy goals, an ambitious effort to retool our economy and our
institutions to meet the challenge of climate change that we all know is
very real.
As vice president, Biden led the "cancer moonshot" effort to break
through longstanding barriers and deliver a major win not just for his
fellow countrymen, but for all humanity. That same spirit can now
animate his entire presidency. Addressing climate change is necessary to
make America stronger and safer, but it's also part of our leadership
role in protecting the entire planet. That's the kind of president Biden
promises to be, and it's the kind of president he can be if he uses the
right strategy to mobilize and unite the country in a way that truly
meets the moment.
https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2020/12/08/biden-climate-unity-grijalva-443650
[15 min video]
*How Living at the South Pole Works*
nov 19, 2020
Wendover Productions
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZAEydOjnWyQ
- -
[Personal tour of an environmentally controlled dwelling]
*Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station Tour!!*
Jan 19, 2020
Gone Venturing
The Amundsen-Scott South Pole Elevated Station Tour! Come with me and
take a tour of the entire Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station! In this
video I show you pretty much all of the public and social areas, the
dorm areas, and even some work centers! If you've ever wondered what the
South Pole Station looks like, well, here ya go!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2bnRnqaKxZ8
[Digging back into the internet news archive]
*On this day in the history of global warming - December 10, 2008 *
On MSNBC's "The Rachel Maddow Show," Brian Hardwick of the Alliance for
Climate Protection denounces a borderline-blasphemous holiday marketing
campaign by the coal industry.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TaGun1X8E2s
/-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------/
/Archive of Daily Global Warming news
<https://pairlist10.pair.net/pipermail/theclimate.vote/2017-October/date.html>
/
https://pairlist10.pair.net/pipermail/theclimate.vote
/To receive daily mailings - click to Subscribe
<mailto:subscribe at theClimate.Vote?subject=Click%20SEnD%20to%20process%20your%20request>
to news digest./
*** Privacy and Security:*This mailing is text-only. It does not carry
images or attachments which may originate from remote servers. A
text-only message can provide greater privacy to the receiver and sender.
By regulation, the .VOTE top-level domain must be used for democratic
and election purposes and cannot be used for commercial purposes.
Messages have no tracking software.
To subscribe, email: contact at theclimate.vote
<mailto:contact at theclimate.vote> with subject subscribe, To Unsubscribe,
subject: unsubscribe
Also you may subscribe/unsubscribe at
https://pairlist10.pair.net/mailman/listinfo/theclimate.vote
Links and headlines assembled and curated by Richard Pauli for
http://TheClimate.Vote <http://TheClimate.Vote/> delivering succinct
information for citizens and responsible governments of all levels. List
membership is confidential and records are scrupulously restricted to
this mailing list.
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <https://pairlist10.pair.net/pipermail/theclimate.vote/attachments/20201210/bdc587f0/attachment.html>
More information about the TheClimate.Vote
mailing list